My Friends

I have just decided that I haven't done justice to the people with whom I have fallen in love here in Virginia. That stops now.

Surita was the first person in my program I became friends with. I honestly started to talk to her because she was the prettiest girl in my group therapy class, which was our first class of the semester. Later, I found out that she thought the same thing about me and that was why she started talking to me. I've since learned that Surita is even more beautiful inside. She is young and energetic and has an optimism that never fails. She is strong and independent and incredibly on task with every color-coded event in her date book. She loves big. Huge. And with every part of herself. She has incredible insight to people and situations and has this uncanny ability to read between the lines like no one I've ever met. When she listens, you know she is listening because you can almost see her physically absorbing the words coming out of your mouth. After I'd only known her a couple weeks she made a comment about us being friends for the rest of our lives and I knew it would be true.

Hannah was the first person I really met here. Kelly and I were sitting on the couch watching The Abyss when she walked through the front door and said, "Hi, I live here too. I'm Hannah." Then she went to her room until the end of the movie, when she re-emerged into our conversation and sat chatting with us for quite a while about work, school, traveling, you name it. Hannah is full of great stories and many of them being with something like "One time when I was in Austria..." or "When I lived on this Scottish island..." or "Oh my goodness, in Honduras they..." My favorite story is the one where she had a run-in with the head of the Croatian maffia. She gets stressed when she has a lot going on, but when things calm down she always comes back to me and apologizes for being cranky. She gets so excited about absolutely everything with childlike glee. She loves people and parties and conversations and good friend circles. She also loves competitions and likes turning whatever she can into a race of some sort. I don't think I've ever met someone so motivated to be absolutely amazing every single day.

Abby is almost paradoxical to me because she says that she needs to learn to be stronger, but I see her as already having achieved that. Abby has left her home and her boyfriend of four years to pursue her degree here, all of which causes her to struggle inside. She doesn't get down about it, though. She sees what will be there for her in the end and she knows that everything right now is worth it. She has invested herself in this program and the rest of us in the program in a way I never could. She talks to everyone and knows what is going on with them and makes sure to ask them periodically how they're doing. She has a sort of city-savvy attitude that amuses me here in little Williamsburg; I see her loving Chicago. Her mid-west attitude of life is a little laissez-faire, a little goal-oriented and a lot personal because she really places her heart in what she does. Incredibly generous and incredibly helpful, her strength really lies in what she is truly able to do for othe people completely effortlessly because to her it is like breathing.

Carmen appears seemless to me in the respect that her life, rather than aspects of it being pieced together like a quilt, fades from one thing to the next like a gentle wash of myriad colors. She is always calm and collected and generally up-beat about things. Nothing in her life is out of place; rather, it all just manages to fit nicely together in a manner that allows her to handle things as they come. She loves Christmas videos and started listening to holiday music about two weeks ago. This girl is incredibly smart, especially concerning American history and politics. She is going to make just about the best elementary school teacher on the planet, with one asset being her soothing, calming voice that, even as an adult, makes me want to sit down and listen all night. She is also incredibly good humored. She is so good at making small talk with strangers of all sorts while at the same time being so good at really connecting with a person and knowing all the important things to ask.

Helene is much more integrated in all of our lives than she realizes. She is friendly and helpful and willing to try just about anything. She allows me to be a little more crazy than normal, mostly, I think, just because she wants to see what is going to happen. She has a wonderful sense of humor, laughs easily and can usually keep the laughter coming. She is relaxed in the way she handles just about everything, from work/school stress to her silly friends. She gives great spontaneous compliments and is able to really voice her true, uncomplicated thoughts on a situation. When she encourages, sometimes it sounds more like peer pressure, which makes me laugh. When she sincerely encourages, it makes you think you were ridiculous for ever having doubted yourself.

Kat is my third roommate. There is a lot about this girl that confuses me, but the basic quality of her nature is a gentle, loving woman with an overwhelming sense of generosity. She is very simple and doesn't get caught up or fooled by the pretentions of life that distract most other people.